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THIS BANGING BAND

by Simon O’ Mauve, The Impartial Reporter, 24th August 2008

If there is any space at all for subversion in pop music, then that place is occupied by The Big Bang. If there has been any creative advancement at all in the music industry in the last months, then that progression has been forged by The Big Bang. If there’s been one debut album that can safely lay claim to being a complete signal post in the history of popular music, then it it the aptly titled COMEBACK by The Big Bang. And if there’s been only one band since The Smiths in the 1980’s to upset the cosseted old Biz and genuinely excite record buyers again, then it’s…
“By rights we really shouldn’t be here,” The Big Bang’s charismatic leader Moksha Freeman from Damascus (!) states. “People want to throw a blanket over even the slightest mention of The Big Bang, and the industry spends all its time denying that we’re a phenomenon. I think it’s because we have this grain of intellect and passion, and when you as a band are trying to lay down the rules you’re actually spoiling things for so many business mediocrities who control the whole sphere of popular music. Let me tell you, the music industry absolutely detest The Big Bang.”
Not so strange, then, that both Freeman and his long-time song-writing partner Elektro K both seem like desperate men hugging an invaluable patent, hanging on to that magic ingredient that very occasionally makes pop music so special.
“It’s just that you have to hold on to what you want to say very tight,” Elektro K explains, “because there are so many people in the media trying to trip you up and push you over and catch you out and unveil you. They are all feeding and nursing each other. They hate themselves for it and they hate anyone else who does what they do. They are full of jealousy and sourness and bitterness and fear. Everybody in it is a failed writer or bassist or football star. They all want to be on stage – it doesn’t matter what they do, they all want to be you. But the mere fact that you have that and nobody can take it away from you, is your ultimate weapon.”
In short, Freeman and Elektro K belong to the old protest school with guts – the one where the singer names names. There were very few like them – Dylan, Lennon, Morrissey, Eminem… well, probably -, and there have been less over the years, but Freeman says he knows The Big Bang will be here for a long time.
“We’re not just fashionable – in fact I don’t know what fashion is. It’s quite simple: before we came there was no outlet for emotion – people couldn’t tear their coat and jump on somebody’s head.”
Freeman has just reached that thin first rug on the success ladder that he’d always dreamt he’s attain, but always hoped he’d never have to deal with. For a lot of people success comes easy: you get voted for in a TV-show, you hire a 24-hour gorilla, you stick a rolled fiver to your nose, and then put out one album a year with a vile cover for the rest of your days. But Freeman and his fans know that The Big Bang could never move comfortably within the realms of affluence, for the man exudes one thing above all else – integrity.
“I will die for what I sing,” he boasts, and it’s totally convincing.
Just listen!

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• MOKSHA FREEMAN